God came to Balaam that night, and said to him, “If the men have come to call you, get up and go with them; but the word that I will say to you, that you must do.”

Balaam said to the angel of the Lord, “I have sinned, for I did not know that you stood against me in the road. ¹  So now, if it is evil in your sight, ²  I will go back home.” ³ 

‘If Balak would give me his palace full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond ¹  the commandment ²  of the Lord to do either good or evil of my own will, ³  but whatever the Lord tells me I must speak’?

For the Lord had said of them, “They will surely die in the wilderness.” And there was not left a single man of them, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.

‘Because they have not followed me wholeheartedly, ¹  not ²  one of the men twenty years old and upward ³  who came from Egypt will see the land that I swore to give ⁴  to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,

but we will maintain ourselves in armed readiness ¹  and go before the Israelites until whenever we have brought them to their place. Our descendants will be living in fortified towns as a protection against ²  the inhabitants of the land.

Moses said to them: “If the Gadites and the Reubenites cross the Jordan with you, each one equipped for battle in the Lord’s presence, and you conquer the land, ¹  then you must allot them the territory of Gilead as their possession.

“You must not pollute the land where you live, for blood defiles the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed there, except by the blood of the person who shed it.

Remember the whole way by which he ¹  has brought you these forty years through the desert ²  so that he might, by humbling you, test you to see if you have it within you to keep his commandments or not.

Now if you forget the Lord your God at all ¹  and follow other gods, worshiping and prostrating yourselves before them, I testify to you today that you will surely be annihilated.

Now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you except to revere him, ¹  to obey all his commandments, ²  to love him, to serve him ³  with all your mind and being, ⁴ 

Now, if you pay close attention ¹  to my commandments that I am giving you today and love ²  the Lord your God and serve him with all your mind and being, ³ 

For if you carefully observe all of these commandments ¹  I am giving you ²  and love the Lord your God, live according to his standards, ³  and remain loyal to him,

and the curse if you pay no attention ¹  to his ²  commandments and turn from the way I am setting before ³  you today to pursue ⁴  other gods you have not known.

Only in the presence of the Lord your God may you eat these, in the place he ¹  chooses. This applies to you, your son, your daughter, your male and female servants, and the Levites ²  in your villages. In that place you will rejoice before the Lord your God in all the output of your labor. ³ 

but you must sacrifice it ¹  in the evening in ²  the place where he ³  chooses to locate his name, at sunset, the time of day you came out of Egypt.

If a man marries a woman and she does not please him because he has found something offensive ¹  in her, then he may draw up a divorce document, give it to her, and evict her from his house.

“If you indeed ¹  obey the Lord your God and are careful to observe all his commandments I am giving ²  you today, the Lord your God will elevate you above all the nations of the earth.

“But if you ignore ¹  the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force: ² 

“If you refuse to obey ¹  all the words of this law, the things written in this scroll, and refuse to fear this glorious and awesome name, the Lord your God,